Improving healthcare through social media
Episode 115
: [00:00:01] Welcome to the Outcomes Rocket podcast where we inspire collaborative thinking improved outcomes and business success with today’s most successful and inspiring healthcare leaders and influencers. And now your host, Saul Marquez
Saul Marquez: [00:00:19] Outcomes rocket listeners will come back once again to the outcomes rocket podcast where we chat with today’s most successful and inspiring healthcare leaders. I invite you to go yo outcomesrocket.health/reviews where you could take a look at all the listener rating and reviews and you could leave one yourself on what you thought about today’s show. So without further ado I want to introduce our outstanding guest. His name is Daniel Ghinn. He’s the founder and CEO at Creation. He’s leading a team of experts developing insights from online health care professionals using a proprietary technology and service called Creation pinpoint. He’s got a lot of experience in healthcare. Close to a decade and a half maybe or almost two decades actually. And he’s just a master at creating insights for others in what health care providers are thinking. And so Daniel what I want to do is just open up the microphone to you so you could fill in the gaps and welcome you to the podcast.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:01:21] Great. Thank you so well yeah that’s right. I mean it’s been quite a journey. And the thing has always inspired me is in my professional career has been data technology and you know what we can do with that. To make life’s better.
Saul Marquez: [00:01:34] And you guys are certainly doing some pretty cool things to make life better. Daniel you know we had a chance to connect before the podcast then. Can’t wait to get into some of your stories. So why did you decide to get into the medical sector to begin with.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:01:48] Oh yeah that’s a great question sir. I was when I was starting out in my career in the early 1990s. Seems like a long time ago now I got to work with data and all kinds of fields from geophysical exploration to financial data to pharmaceutical market research data. And then the Worldwide Web came along and I was so excited. I was thinking energy and exchange exactly this is going to change all our lives. And so we launched the company that is my wife and I we launched the company together that is now called Creation and it happens among our first ever clients were doctors health clinics and pharmaceutical companies and really quickly realized that if the Internet was going to change our lives in any way that actually in the area of healthcare had to be the greatest potential to really make a huge difference there.
Saul Marquez: [00:02:39] And you guys definitely have made some headway there. What would you say. Daniel a hot topic that should be on every medical leaders agenda today and how are you guys addressing them.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:02:48] It has to be get to the data. I mean now more than ever. We’ve got so much data out there. We’re working with that creation and working with global NGOs working with most of the biggest pharmaceutical companies. And what I see is these organizations and I suppose it must be true in every sector. It’s so easy to make decisions based on what we know. I mean what we think we know is all we can really what about other data that we don’t know about that could help us that you know inform that decision. So for example when we started listening to the front seat conversations of healthcare professionals through our platforms creation in point we had no idea what we would really find there but we started seeing for example emergency physicians all over the world tweeting during an emergency in E.R. for example to get immediate advice from peers that they trusted anywhere else in the world. And this was actually changing the way they practice emergency medicine. And I think that you know the thing for leaders in health care is that these kinds of behaviors are creating a massive amount of new data. So now we’re tapping into billions of social media posts that have been shared by health professionals and we can ask that data for example what is the unmet need of nurses vaccinating children in France or what keeps hospital pharmacists awake at night. Because we know when when they the that. How do oncologists in the United States decide on the right treatment pathways for cancer patients. So now healthcare leaders can discover new things and if those leaders are right. Pharmaceutical company for example they can make better decisions about supporting their customers if they’re an NGO. They can understand how to develop policies to get better healthcare. It’s a key areas of need.
Saul Marquez: [00:04:39] Hey that’s really cool Daniel. And you did a really nice job of walking me through earlier on sort of creation pinpoint but for the benefit of the guests can you let them know what exactly the platform does.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:04:52] Yes we.
Saul Marquez: [00:04:52] Think it’s really cool.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:04:53] Oh thank you. Thanks. We started out you know along the way we were doing a lot of analysis of digital health stakeholders behavioral health stakeholders digital behaviors and we were doing was I guess combat’s in social media listening listening to all that conversation happening out there on social media channels twitter and logs and Instagram and all these things and a client said so us you know this is great but summering there is a prescriber I want to know what the prescriber is thinking and saying and we realize that in that data a very small percentage of it was coming from doctors and also nurses and pharmacists and other health care professionals. And so we developed a methodology and then technology to actually distill just the health care professional voice to roll out of a noise to remove 95 or more percent of the other noise and actually just distill it down the health care professionals perspective.
Saul Marquez: [00:05:46] And you know the thing that that comes to mind listeners is let’s just say for example you’re a hospital administrator and you send out a survey to your clinicians just to know what’s going on and what’s on their mind. Let’s just be honest not all the time people are not going to be honest all the time. They’re not going to answer those questions with 100 percent honesty. That’s where Danielle steps in and says look this is our latest data mining on what clinicians believe about X and this gives you a pressure test on the organization a pressure test new ideas and that’s what makes it cool. You know it’s not just making assumptions you’re actually working to find the data with people being brutally honest on social media. Right. Daniel.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:06:31] That’s so true, Saul. Where we’ve actually spoken with doctors and others about how they use social media. They tell us that you know online they would often open up and share ideas and thoughts that they would never talk about in their own hospital Kardos even experts. You know 25 year experience specialist physician and he said I will take advice from all kinds of other health care professionals who are just on line in different roles different levels of seniority. And I said to him have your own hospital and he said no not in the same way as whole as what illness ensues. So that really interesting.
Saul Marquez: [00:07:05] It is fascinating what happens to to just the inhibitions. It’s just fascinating and I think it’s so cool that you guys are doing this. Give me an example Daniel of how you guys have improved outcomes with what you’re doing.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:07:19] You know I think that improving outcomes is really about thinking differently as well as doing differently. And one example that comes to mind is we were working with a global NGO and they were concerned about how to use limited budgets to communicate across different locations more effectively. The problem was when you start with the premise that Buche is limited that can quickly become your focus and so it becomes difficult to get away from that conversation about how we don’t have enough resources. And so we were able to help and to take a step back to stop talking about the limits of the budget and instead look at the capacity they did have a look at the tools they did have and the data they did happen to find better ways of connecting stakeholders to work together more effectively. Often I think that’s what it comes down to you know people working together better will change the world. I believe it. And I think if you have good data analysis can really help that because it can help people to see things in a different way.
Saul Marquez: [00:08:18] That’s such a great call. You know you said doing and thinking and before you do you think and this is such a great example of if you start with the wrong question you could start with a very limiting position. Sounds like you guys help the organization you partner with to think bigger provided data and boom now. Are they communicating gangbusters are they getting their message out.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:08:41] Yeah well I went back in and I did a follow up session with the organization and about a year or more later. One of the leaders who covered the kind of Africa the Africa region he came back and he said you know what we discovered last time we got together has transformed the way we do health communications across the whole of the Africa region. So I felt I was happy about that. OK good like a good outcome really.
Saul Marquez: [00:09:04] That’s awesome man. That’s awesome. Congratulations for giving them that perspective and to them for being able to take it. Give us a mistake Daniel of a time when you failed and what you learned from it too.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:09:15] That’s yeah I say How can you not love learning new things. And isn’t it often the way that learning new things comes by figuring out what’s not working and.
Saul Marquez: [00:09:23] That’s right.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:09:24] I think you know I fail on a regular daily basis that an ongoing basis.
Saul Marquez: [00:09:29] You eat breakfast right. We are. That’s right.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:09:33] Yeah I think that’s you know it’s a series of mistakes and sometimes getting things you think I learned something and I and I craved that when I look back over the time we spent I mean we’ve established that creation is coming out for 20 years now and eight years since he founded the company amazing. When I look back to the early years you know when you’re growing a small business especially as a cell phone business as we’ve always been you’re always trying to balance resources and you need capacity to deliver great things and to innovate. But then you need to finance to pay for that and to make it happen. So in the early years we had some pretty painful learning experiences around probably 15 years ago or so that took us to a really challenging place. You know we ran a large project and the Holovaty was focused on that for about six months because it was so on the project itself we went out there looking for new business for future business. You know as a as a commercial company as something you have to do it no matter what amazing mission you may have if you don’t get funding in some way you’re not going to get to do that. And so we suddenly we completed that project and we had this great team of skilled people but no work to do. And I was definitely a mistake. We learned from that it was tough. You know it really has everything out are we. We won that you know how do we even carry over this but we nearly had to make it work because we were so passionate about the vision we had. So in the end we sort through a lot of hard work a lot of prayer. And today we’re a lot more strategic about how we plan for future business. And we still pray but we get strategic has made a difference.
Saul Marquez: [00:11:02] And that’s great. Daniel what a great reminder. And it’s so easy to forget that you’ve got to make sure that you have revenue coming in consistently because if you don’t without margin there is no mission and to. And you guys hustled and you’re able to come back from that place. So it’s really interesting right. Like they say be passionate. Be mission driven. But man somewhere in between there you got to make sure that you keep the lights on.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:11:31] Absolutely right. Absolutely right. My wife and business partner is the feet on the ground as part of the business. She’s a financial director Ceci she understands what’s happening and she always keeps me balanced from that. So I’m not running off at some vision that’s OK. We get a good a great partnership with CNN through the hour.
Saul Marquez: [00:11:48] God bless her too and the work that she does there I mean you guys are a dynamic duo. Yeah I think so. So Danielle take us to the other side of this right. You took us to a dark moment where you know you guys almost shut down. Take us to one of your proudest moments.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:12:03] Yeah I think that’s when it’s not so much about one big moment but when I look back I think there are many simple highlights that stand out and I can feel happy about when people make changes to improve things that and that decision is driven by our data and where we can help them make that decision. Sometimes it can be a long time later. Like I mentioned with example in Africa that I hear about is change somebody’s made it seem as if somebody decided to communicate better or to empower someone or to try a new approach. There’s a code of vets or surgeons who started a movement on Twitter and then we helped to analyze how his online network was enabling surgeons all over the world to learn and collaborate. And when we did that is what was then published and that was a proud moment really to be part of that process. I learned I heard recently how a company restructured its communication with physicians after learning about their actual needs which they hadn’t previously realized through the work that we did those kind of things I think are the problem.
Saul Marquez: [00:13:02] I think that’s great Daniel and sort of what resonates is I think the listeners about what you do is is that you put the practitioner the prescriber in focus and it’s the quadruple aim you’re making sure that you’re improving outcomes for the provider as well.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:13:20] Yeah absolutely. Yeah that’s a key part of it.
Saul Marquez: [00:13:22] Daniel this is cool. So let’s dive into one of your most exciting projects today.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:13:28] Great. Yeah I always get excited when we get access to new data. So we’re doing all sorts of things at the moment to go deeper and wider with our data to build an even better picture of healthcare professionals. And one way of doing that is in collaboration with some close physician networks in the U.S. and Europe. So now all of our data has come from the public open source is on social media and now we’ve got access through some agreements insu and technology integrations into IP AIs into close position that was to get anonymized verbatim data on what physicians are saying in these private networks. And that’s a really exciting process to learn and I am really rich experience sharing among physicians and to combine that with the data that we have that sharing in public. So right now we’re planning some early research in oncology you know an area where there is so much to be done in discovering treatments and caring for patients and if we can reveal insight in there I’ll be super happy.
Saul Marquez: [00:14:32] Wow that’s really brilliant man and it’s cool that you guys are forming these relationships to go beyond public domains and into API. That is exciting. Good for you. So Daniel let’s pretend you and I are building a medical leadership course on what it takes to be successful in medicine. It’s the 101 or the ABC of Daniel Ghinn. It’s a syllabus we’re going to construct here my friend and I have got four lightning round questions for you. And then we’re going to finish with a book that you recommend to the listeners. You ready.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:01] Great yeah.
Saul Marquez: [00:15:02] Awesome. What is the best way to improve health care outcomes.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:06] Listen listen to people and listen to data.
Saul Marquez: [00:15:10] What is the biggest mistake or pitfall to avoid.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:13] A see. In other words ignore the data.
Saul Marquez: [00:15:17] I love it. How do you stay relevant as an organization. Despite constant change.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:22] Don’t wait for that change drive it. And to do that. Keep listening.
Saul Marquez: [00:15:27] What is one area or focus that should drive everything in the organization.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:32] Transform nations.
Saul Marquez: [00:15:34] And finally Daniel what book would you recommend to the listeners here on the syllabus.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:15:39] I’m glad you asked me that so I’m reading a book at the moment by Danielle Ofri day. She is a practicing physician Associate Professor at New York University’s School of Medicine. The book is what patients say what doctors hear is a rarity. It’s full of anecdotes about patient physician interaction and I love how she tells the story of that interaction and the results of that. But it’s essentially a book about communication. So although you might read it as a story about the health care system I’m a physician patient interactions actually whether or not you are in healthcare. It’s a fascinating thought provoking challenging read about communication.
Saul Marquez: [00:16:23] I love it and so much of what we do is communication and health care outcomes rocket listeners. This is just a wonderful book that Mr. Jhinn has just recommended and the syllabus is just outstanding. So I urge. You just go to outcomesrocket.health/ghinn I m and that’s N as in Nancy G H I and and you’ll be able to find the syllabus that we’re creating right now and all of the show notes of the things that we’ve discussed today. So Daniel This has been so much fun. But before we conclude I love if you just share a closing thought with the listeners and then the best place where they can get in touch with you.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:17:02] Great closing thoughts in the world of changing Nation’s for better health and flies and just getting started. There’s an exciting future. And you can find me on Twitter @creationdaniel and you can email daniel@creation.co
Saul Marquez: [00:17:19] Fantastic Daniel. This has been such a pleasure. I really thank you so much for taking the time for be here with us and looking forward to seeing the insights that you guys continue to make.
Daniel Ghinn: [00:17:29] Saul thank you so much sir for the opportunity to spend time with you on this.
: [00:17:38] Thanks for listening to the Outcomes Rocket podcast. Be sure to visit us on the web at www.outcomesrocket.health for the show notes, resources, inspiration and so much more.
Recommended Book/s:
What patients say, What doctors hear
The Best Way To Contact Daniel:
